"Lost her passport?" the clerk echoed; he shuddered at the information. "It seems to upset you," Sylvia said. "Well, it's a pretty serious matter in war-time," he explained. "However, we have nothing to do with passports at the Consulate." The clerk washed his hands of Sylvia's past and future, and she left the Consulate to discover the other office. By the time she arrived it was nearly five o'clock, and the clerk looked hurt at receiving a visitor so late. "Do you want a visa for England?" he asked. She nodded, and he pointed to a printed notice that hung above his desk. "The morning is the time to make such applications," he told her, fretfully. "Then why are you open in the afternoon?" Sylvia asked. "If the application is favorably entertained, the recommendation is granted in the afternoon. You must then take your passport to the Consulate for the consular visa, which can only be done in the morning between twelve and one." It was like the eternal competition between the tube-lifts and the tube-trains, she thought. "But they told me at the Consulate that they have nothing to do with passports." "The Consulate _has_ nothing to do with passports until the applicant for a visa has been approved here." "Then I must come again to-morrow morning?" Sylvia asked. "To-morrow morning," the clerk repeated, bending over with intrepid fervor to the responsible task upon which he was engaged. Sylvia wondered what it was: the whole traffic of Europe might hang upon these few minutes. "I'm sorry to interrupt you again," she said. "But in addition to requiring a visa, my sister wants a new passport." She decided not to say anything about a lost passport, the revelation of which had so much shocked the man at the Consulate. "Miss Johnstone," the clerk called in a weary voice to somebody in an inner office, "kindly bring Form AQ--application for renewal of expired passport." A vague-looking young woman, who seemed to have been collecting native jewelry since her arrival in Bucharest, tinkled into the office. "There aren't any AQ forms left, Mr. Mathers," she said, plaiting, as she spoke, a necklace of coins into another of what looked like broken pieces of mosaic. "It really is too bad that the forms are not given out more regularly," Mr. Mathers cried, in exasperation. "How am I to finish transferring these Greeks beginning with _C_ to _K_? You know how anxious Mr. Iredale is to get the index in order, and the _F_'s haven't been checked with the _Ph_'s yet." "Well, it's Miss Henson's day off," said Miss Johnstone, "so it's not my fault, is it? I'm sure I hate the forms! They're always a bother. Won't an AP one do for this lady? We've a lot of them left, and there's only a difference in one question." "Excuse me," Sylvia asked. "Did you mention a Mr. Iredale?" "Mr. Iredale is the O.C.P.T.N.C. for Bucharest," said Mr. Mathers. "Not Mr. Philip Iredale, by chance?" she went on.